Modern commerce and promotional activities that are conducted across networks, such as the Internet, can involve several discrete entities. There has been a clear trend toward structuring agreements between the discrete entities so that compensation is performance-based. For example, a retail web site may desire to compensate a portal web site based on transactions conducted by consumers referred to the retail web site by the portal web site. This is as opposed to the retail web site paying a flat monthly advertising fee to the portal web site.
The flexibility available to entities conducting commercial transactions over networks has been limited. The complexity of the agreements that the entities can enter into has been limited because of the lack of sufficient tracking and reporting tools. Tracking has been a particular problem when activities have been performed across multiple platforms such as the Internet, wireless networks, digital television, and off-line communication methods. As a result, entities have often paid lump sum payments for services that may not have been performed.
Therefore, there exists a need in the art for tracking and reporting tools that monitor and report commerce and promotional activities conducted across networks, so that entities involved in transactions are not limited in the complexity of the compensation agreements that they can enter into.